Rule 60.Relief from judgment or order

Trial Rule 60 covers two different problems. Subdivision (A) handles clerical slips — a misspelled name, a number carried over incorrectly from the evidence, a typo in the judgment — and lets the trial court fix them on its own or on a party’s motion, at any time before the clerk’s Notice of Completion of the Clerk’s Record is filed for appeal. Once that notice is filed and the case is on appeal, the trial court needs the appellate court’s permission to make the correction.

Subdivision (B) is the heavier tool: a motion asking the court to set aside a judgment or order, including one entered by default. The rule lists eight grounds, each triggering its own timing rule. Mistake, surprise, or excusable neglect (ground 1); any ground that would support a motion to correct error under Rule 59, including evidence that could not have been found in time for that motion (ground 2); fraud, misrepresentation, or other misconduct by the opposing party (ground 3); and a default or default judgment entered against someone who was served only by publication and had no actual knowledge of the case (ground 4) — all four must be raised within a reasonable time and no later than one year after the judgment, order, or proceeding. Three more grounds carry no one-year cap, only a reasonable-time requirement: a party proving they were an infant or an incompetent person who was not represented by a guardian, subject to a detailed six-part test and a ninety-day window after the disability ends or a guardian is appointed (ground 5); a judgment that is void (ground 6); and a judgment that has been satisfied, released, discharged, built on a since-reversed judgment, or that would now be inequitable to keep enforcing (ground 7). A final catch-all (ground 8) covers any other reason justifying relief, so long as it is not one already covered by grounds 1 through 4. Anyone moving under grounds 1, 2, 3, 4, or 8 must also allege a meritorious claim or defense. Filing the motion does not pause the judgment or affect its finality — a separate stay has to be requested.

Indiana’s list runs longer than the federal one because it keeps the publication-default and infant-or-incompetent scenarios as their own numbered grounds rather than folding them into a general catch-all. The rule also does away with the old writs — coram nobis, coram vobis, audita querela, and bills of review — and channels all of that relief through the motion described here or through an independent action, which remains available for fraud on the court itself. A ruling on a Rule 60(B) motion counts as a final judgment for appeal purposes, though a change of venue away from the judge or county requires an affidavit showing cause. When the court takes up the motion, it can hear evidence, bring in new parties by summons, allow discovery, and grant the same range of relief available under Rule 59. The rule applies to infants, incompetents, and governmental organizations as well, though the deadlines are not extended for them beyond what the rule itself allows.